One After Another

Lu Fumin, having traveled a long and dusty road, arrived in Shanmei, Lingnan, from Tianshui, thousands of miles away, accompanied by three subordinates.

After getting off at the Urban Passenger Station in Shanmei, the group had barely stepped out of the station entrance when they were surrounded by several motorcycle taxi drivers.

"Villager, where are you headed?"

"I know the city like the back of my hand; take my ride and I guarantee you'll be satisfied."

"I..."

Lu Fumin hurriedly declined, "No need."

The four of them hailed a taxi.

"Brother, here on official business?" the taxi driver asked curiously while driving.

Lu Fumin smiled, "Indeed, it is for official business."

"You wouldn't happen to be here to inspect the Guizhuling Recycling Plant, would you?"

"Oh? You have a sharp eye, brother."

The taxi driver revealed a mouthful of yellow teeth, "Haha, it's not a sharp eye; it's just that a lot of officials have been coming these days. I've already picked up two groups for that same business."

"That many?"

The taxi driver replied as if it were nothing, "Not many. Ever since that contract in Hui City was signed, plenty of places from Guangdong Province and Fujian Province have been coming over. You guys are actually on the late side."

Lu Fumin smiled helplessly, "Actually, we came quite early, it's just that the distance is too great."

"Your accents sound like they're from the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia region. You wouldn't really have come all the way from the Great Northwest, would you!"

"Haha, we did indeed come from Tianshui."

Chatting along the way, once they reached the hotel, Lu Fumin and his team, not wanting to waste any time, asked the taxi driver to head straight to the Guizhuling Industrial Park.

They arrived at the entrance of the Guizhuling Industrial Park.

There were already a dozen people registering and undergoing checks at the gate. Judging by their accents, they also seemed to be from the Northwest. After following behind them for a dozen minutes, they discovered they were from Chang'an City.

Once both sides learned of each other's background, they immediately teamed up to inspect the factory together. To accommodate these visitors, the factory had organized a professional reception team.

After touring the waste recycling plant area, they arrived at the partially open sewage treatment workshop, where they watched as a constant stream of sewage was purified into clean water.

Looking at the water before them, which was being continuously discharged into drainage ditches and flowing toward the river, Lu Fumin felt a pang of heartache. He had previously inspected two water plants in Tianshui, and the water quality there was far inferior to the water in this pool.

He turned to the team leader from Chang'an and said, "This technology could be used in water treatment plants, though I wonder what the cost would be."

Pang Haoran, the team leader from Chang'an, turned to the receptionist and asked, "Xiao Zhang, does your company sell this sewage treatment equipment?"

"This involves certain trade secrets. The company's equipment is not for sale to outsiders; for the time being, it is only for our own use," the receptionist, Xiao Zhang, replied with a smile.

Upon hearing this, Pang Haoran, Lu Fumin, and the others were deeply disappointed.

Suiren Company adopted a bundled sales approach in this regard; they would only allow the establishment of a local plant if the local government agreed to sanitation and water utility contracts.

This was partly to ensure a long-term stream of revenue. After all, selling equipment was a one-off deal, whereas setting up a plant to sell water was a sustainable industry, so they naturally prioritized the latter.

After more than three hours of inspection, the delegations from Chang'an and Tianshui arrived at the headquarters of Suiren Company.

Jiang Hailin, who had rushed over from Hui City, was temporarily presiding over work in place of Lin Baijie. The two sides held discussions, but regarding Suiren Company's requirements for contracting sanitation services, water utilities, and entering the gas market, neither Pang Haoran nor Lu Fumin could make a decision, so they could only return to their respective cities with the cooperation proposals.

Indeed, there were no shortage of cities troubled by this same dilemma, just like them.

Just as the country was still reminiscing about the Olympics and caught in a craze over Suiren Company's new type of recycling plant, the international community suffered a fatal blow in September.

Lehman Brothers went bankrupt. This situation instantly ignited the subprime mortgage crisis, and the global financial market fell into chaos.

Amidst his busy schedule, Huang Xiuyuan took the time to communicate with his managers in Xiangjiang. Seizing the opportunity, Huang's International gained significant profits over the course of nearly ten days.

The funds currently reserved in Xiangjiang reached 736 million USD.

He immediately withdrew 500 million USD, transferring it back to Suiren Company in China in batches.

With the injection of these funds, the cash reserves held by Suiren Company reached 5.2 billion Huayuan. It is important to note that this was cash, not assets.

Many companies had market capitalizations in the tens of billions, but if asked to produce 5.2 billion in cash, they might truly be unable to do so—especially those internet companies filled with "water" (inflated value); it would be good enough if they weren't tens of billions in debt, let alone having 5.2 billion in cash.

Armed with sufficient cash, Suiren Company began a frantic expansion.

For instance, the newly established Hui City branch used its land and water utility company shares to take out a 300 million loan from the bank, which served as investment for the waste recycling plant, sewage treatment plant, water plant, liquefied gas storage station, logistics warehouse, and employee dormitories.

September 18.

Huang Xiaojun of the Veolia Company China branch arrived with an inspection team for a visit.

Suiren Company was actually quite familiar with this competitor, as there were indirect conflicts of interest with Veolia in the investment plan for Pengcheng.

Since Lin Baijie was still presiding over work in Hui City, and Huang Xiuyuan had no interest in engaging in empty pleasantries with them, Jiang Hailin had to step up.

Having just been promoted to vice general manager of the head office, Jiang Hailin received the group at the headquarters. After a round of corporate flattery, Huang Xiaojun probed:

"Our Veolia Company is very optimistic about the recycling technology and sewage treatment technology developed by your company. I wonder if it would be possible to inspect the specific situation?"

"Guests are welcome, so naturally, that is no problem." Jiang Hailin smiled on the surface, but in reality, he was on guard against them.

Upon arriving inside the Guizhuling Industrial Park, the Veolia personnel had their electronic devices confiscated, and only five people were allowed to enter, with one-on-one monitoring enforced.

Furthermore, the core area inside the factory had long been handled with strict confidentiality; unless Suiren Company provided a clear explanation, it was almost impossible to figure out the detailed situation within.

In particular, those key technologies and operating costs were top-secret information for Suiren Company, so they naturally could not be disclosed to these foreign enterprises.

After observing for several hours, Huang Xiaojun could only see some superficial aspects; how the specific operating costs were calculated and what technologies were used to achieve them remained a blur, like looking at flowers through a fog.

During this period, he also tried to probe Jiang Hailin, but unfortunately, the answers he received were all ambiguous, without even a single concrete figure.

Faced with this situation, Huang Xiaojun and his party were helpless.

It seemed that Suiren Company's technology was very impressive, but the problem was that operating costs were the key; Veolia Company could also achieve this level of recycling, but the costs were prohibitively high.

If Suiren Company was just bluffing, Veolia Company dared not take the gamble, especially since the subprime mortgage crisis this year had severely impacted them, forcing them to slow down their business expansion in Huaguo.

Judging from Jiang Hailin's attitude, the other party was very cold toward Veolia Company.

Sure enough, after proposing the acquisition and equity participation, before he could even put forward specific terms, Jiang Hailin rejected him without a second thought.

As for the final proposal of technical cooperation, Jiang Hailin rejected that as well; as a high-level executive of Suiren Company, he knew quite a lot.

In his view, Veolia Company's technology was nothing but worthless trash. Lacking neither technology nor capital, and backed by the massive market of Huaguo along with official cooperative ties, Jiang Hailin could not think of any reason to cooperate with them.

A disappointed Huang Xiaojun, faced with the unyielding Jiang Hailin, finally had no choice but to give up and lead his team back to the Beiping branch headquarters.